Standard Bridge Bidding for the 21st Century [Paperback]

Max Hardy (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 9, 2000

A set of simple,modern methods which will enable the social bridge player to bid like the experts.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A broad and comprehensive book that will turn a lot of not so accurate bidders into players... -- Mike Lawrence: World Champion and successful bridge author

Max incorporates recent bridge bidding into the top system of the past 25 years... -- World Champion John Swanson

The five card major reference book for the foreseeable future. -- Eddie Kantar: World Champion and successful bridge author

Product Details

• Paperback: 296 pages
• Publisher: Vivisphere Publishing (October 9, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1587760495
• ISBN-13: 978-1587760495
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #156,725 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #71 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Puzzles & Games > Bridge

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

44 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Content, but Strangely Presented, January 5, 2004

By 

V. Natarajan (Pittsburgh, PA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Standard Bridge Bidding for the 21st Century (Paperback)

What this book is NOT meant for: Not meant for a complete beginner -- this is not a "Learn how to play bridge" book. This book presupposes the knowledge of terms that belong to someone that has already learned at least enough bridge to sit at a table and play (although not necessarily very well). This is a book that is more geared towards teaching someone that already knows something about bridge (and bidding in particular), and gives him/her a self-contained, complete description of the current "standard". I place standard in quotes because I consider his referring to the 2/1 system as "standard" not yet totally accurate (though perhaps before long it will be). Nowadays, at most clubs in the US, you will see a significant percentage of players, even experts, that hold to older standards.

Beyond teaching the 2/1 system, this book goes further into refining your bidding judgement. All too often we've all found ourselves saying "Hey we have 25 (or 26) points, we need to be in game! Damn why did I go down?" Or "Hey, we have only 21 points, but we made slam!", and lament that you were (un)lucky at how well/poorly the hands fit. This book does an excellent job at improving your judgement and hand valuation skills, to actually be able to anticipate when the hands do fit well, and therefore should be bid more aggressively, and when they do not well, and therefore should be treated skeptically. Also this book introduces splinters and other bidding techniques to help discover (mis)fits and further aid your judgement.

Another important point of bidding all-too-often neglected is the need for planning your rebids. Many books pretend that no matter what you bid, you will never have a problem the next time your turn arises. In reality, sometimes you need to make a counter-intuitive bid to facilitate rebidding. Also sometimes you flat out have no good call, and this book gives you advice on how to make the best of such situations. My only complaint is the strange numbering scheme used -- not worth docking a full star for, but somehow I think I ought to be able to give this book 4.5 stars for it.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Perfect for a specific development level, August 15, 2007

By 

Everett Wetchler (San Francisco, CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Standard Bridge Bidding for the 21st Century (Paperback)

This should not be your first bridge book. After you've gotten the basics and have spent some time studying the game, I found this to be a great first 'serious' book to become more than just a light social player.

I bought it after I'd read a couple of introductory books, put in some hours playing hands pretty socially, and begun to read up on more advanced concepts and conventions. I loved the game and wanted to get good (not just good enough to play casually with relatives), and it perfectly fit my purpose.

What hardy does best is to teach you the thinking and the reasoning behind the bids/conventions that he presents. You get a good idea of what exactly you're trying to accomplish at different points in the auction, and then the suggested bids make a lot more sense. I guess a drawback would be that because he devotes so much time to explanation and examples, occasionally there are specific cases which he forgets to address. In that sense it's not an utterly complete bidding strategy, but having a set bid for every little specific situation really important as a developing player.

Hardy also has chapters on competitive bidding, slam bidding, etc, which don't really require you to have read all of the preceding chapters in detail to understand them. This allows you to jump around a bit and keep the material fresh, as the chapters are pretty dense. All of the sections were fantastic, and I really feel like I'm thinking about the game much better and getting a lot more out of auctions. Nothing makes me happier than bidding games with 17 points or slams with 28 when I believe our hands line up correctly.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A master of the 2/1 and other bidding conventions, January 9, 2007

By 

J. Segal (Jerusalem, Israel) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Standard Bridge Bidding for the 21st Century (Paperback)

The book is called Standard Bridge Biddings, but is not suit to the standard, beginner (novice) player. To enjoy this book you have to be an advanced bridge player; a novice player will get lost right from the beginning. The book is written in a quite awkward way, and not in a clear step by step sequence, suggesting the author assumes that the reader is well acquainted with the game. Saying that, Max Hardy is well versed in the intricacy of the game, providing a broad array of bidding conventions, many having an in depth description,evaluation and analysis, especially the 2/1. I, for one, learned and enjoyed the book very much, and highly recommend it to the advanced player who wishes to improve his game.